
Millions from books: Here's what Supreme Court financial disclosures show
Show Caption
Hide Caption
Ketanji Brown Jackson lights up stage at Broadway musical "& Juliet"
Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson treated "& Juliet" fans to a special performance for one night only!
WASHINGTON − Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson made more than $2 million last year for her best-selling memoir, according to the latest round of financial disclosure reports for the justices which became public on June 17.
Jackson's book, 'Lovely One,' made the New York Time's bestseller list when it came out last year amid an extensive publicity tour for the court's newest member.
That's much more than the $250,000 in royalties Justice Neil Gorsuch reported earning last year for a book on the law he co-authored with a former clerk.
But Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett could report eye-popping figures in the future for her forthcoming memoir, which reportedly earned a $2 million advance.
Barrett's book, 'Listening to the Law: Reflections on the Court and Constitution,' is coming out in September.
The annual disclosure reports cover the preceding year of financial activity.
As is his usual practice, Justice Samuel Alito received a 90-day extension to file his annual report.
Jackson, in last year's report, disclosed she'd initially received a $893,750 advance for 'Lovely One.'
More: Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson can throw a punch. Literally.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor continues to receive royalties − $73,944 last year – from children's books she's written. And she received a $60,000 advance from Penguin Random House for "Just Shine,' another children's book to be published in September.
In May, multiple justices recused themselves from deciding whether to accept an appeal involving alleged plagiarism in books published by Penguin Random House. That meant there were not enough justices to consider the appeal, which left in place a lower court's ruling dismissing the lawsuit.
Other outside earnings and travel
In addition to income from their writings, several justices reported outside earnings from teaching.
Barrett and Justice Brett Kavanaugh each received $31,815 from Notre Dame Law School.
Gorsuch received $30,379.91 from George Mason University.
Travel the justices reported, without detailing their cost, included:
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


USA Today
3 hours ago
- USA Today
ESPN analyst believes Lamar Jackson is getting closer to a legacy few will ever match
Longtime ESPN voice believes Ravens star Lamar Jackson is on the cusp of immortality They just don't make them like that anymore... Oh yeah! You remember hearing that a time or two. That's one of those nuggets you probably heard while hanging out with dad (or maybe grandad). It was a phrase meant to show appreciation for the 'good old days, when cars were better built and sofas didn't tear up because you sat on them. They don't make them like Baltimore Ravens star Lamar Jackson either. He's a walking evolution at the quarterback position. He's this generation's Randall Cunningham, a right-handed Steve Young or Michael Vick. 'Action Jackson' is special, and he can still play at a high level for several more years. That's good news for Ravens fans everywhere. But, is Lamar Jackson approaching immortality? Jackson's story is still being written, and it's too early to make determinations about when and how it ends. All we can guarantee is this. If he adds another MVP trophy and wins a Super Bowl or two, we'll be talking about Canton and his Pro Football Hall of Fame argument. Recently, the most unique and compelling of words was attached to his name: immortal. Hmmm... It sounds interesting. Don't blame us. Blame ESPN's Mike Greenberg. He's the one who brought this up. Here's what he said on the subject. "For Lamar and Josh Allen, what they're playing for is immortality. Both of them could retire tomorrow, and they'd be in the Hall of Fame. But, if either of them, and we'll use Lamar in this case because that's who we're talking about, wins a championship, all of a sudden he vaults into that place where the conversation on shows like this one are, 'Where does he belong on the list with the great quarterbacks of all time?' Two regular-season MVPs and a Super Bowl starts that conversation." It's interesting... We'll tell you that. Still, nothing says 'immortal' like having one's bust carved and having it placed in the hallowed football shrine in Canton. Jackson has a chance at having that happen. Winning a Lombardi Trophy will certainly help his argument. There are Super Bowl winners who were never enshrined. There are HOF enshrinees who never won 'the chip'. The AFC is loaded, but this season represents Jackson's best opportunity to win a ring. Let that be his and the Ravens' goal this season. Immortality can wait, even if we can make successful arguments for why he's on his way to arriving there.


Fox News
5 hours ago
- Fox News
FTC firings take spotlight in Trump's fight to erase independence of agencies
The Supreme Court has temporarily allowed President Donald Trump to fire numerous Democrat-appointed members of independent agencies, but one case still moving through the legal system carries the greatest implications yet for a president's authority to do that. In Slaughter v. Trump, a Biden-appointed member of the Federal Trade Commission has vowed to fight what she calls her "illegal firing," setting up a possible scenario in which the case lands before the Supreme Court. The case would pose the most direct question yet to the justices about where they stand on Humphrey's Executor v. United States, the nearly century-old decision regarding a president's power over independent regulatory agencies. John Shu, a constitutional law expert who served in both Bush administrations, told Fox News Digital he thinks the high court is likely to side with the president if and when the case arrives there. "I think it's unlikely that Humphrey's Executor survives the Supreme Court, at least in its current form," Shu said, adding he anticipates the landmark decision will be overturned or "severely narrowed." Humphrey's Executor centered on President Franklin D. Roosevelt's decision to fire an FTC commissioner with whom he disagreed politically. The case marked the first instance of the Supreme Court limiting a president's removal power by ruling that Roosevelt overstepped his authority. The court found that presidents could not dismiss FTC commissioners without a reason, such as malfeasance, before their seven-year terms ended, as outlined by Congress in the FTC Act. However, the FTC's functions, which largely center on combating anticompetitive business practices, have expanded in the 90 years since Humphrey's Executor. "The Federal Trade Commission of 1935 is a lot different than the Federal Trade Commission today," Shu said. He noted that today's FTC can open investigations, issue subpoenas, bring lawsuits, impose financial penalties and more. The FTC now has executive, quasi-legislative and quasi-judicial functions, Shu said. If the Supreme Court's decision to temporarily allow two labor board members' firings is any indication, the high court stands ready to make the FTC less independent and more accountable to Trump. In a 6-3 order, the Supreme Court cited the "considerable executive power" that the National Labor Relations Board and Merit Systems Protection Board have, saying a president "may remove without cause executive officers who exercise that power on his behalf." The order did not mention Humphrey's Executor, but that and other moves indicate the Supreme Court has been chipping away at the 90-year-old ruling and is open to reversing it. The case of Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya gets closest to the heart of Humphrey's Executor. Slaughter enjoyed a short-lived victory when a federal judge in Washington, D.C., found that Trump violated the Constitution and ruled in her favor on July 17. She was able to return to the FTC for a few days, but the Trump administration appealed the decision and, on July 21, the appellate court paused the lower court judge's ruling. Judge Loren AliKhan had said in her summary judgment that Slaughter's case was almost identical to William Humphrey's. "It is not the role of this court to decide the correctness, prudence, or wisdom of the Supreme Court's decisions—even one from ninety years ago," AliKhan, a Biden appointee, wrote. "Whatever the Humphrey's Executor Court may have thought at the time of that decision, this court will not second-guess it now." The lawsuit arose from Trump firing Slaughter and Bedoya, the two Democratic-appointed members of the five-member commission. They alleged that Trump defied Humphrey's Executor by firing them in March without cause in a letter that "nearly word-for-word" mirrored the one Roosevelt sent a century ago. Bedoya has since resigned, but Slaughter is not backing down from a legal fight in which Trump appears to have the upper hand. "Like dozens of other federal agencies, the Federal Trade Commission has been protected from presidential politics for nearly a century," Slaughter said in a statement after she was re-fired. "I'll continue to fight my illegal firing and see this case through, because part of why Congress created independent agencies is to ensure transparency and accountability." Now a three-judge panel comprising two Obama appointees and one Trump appointee is considering a longer-term pause and asked for court filings to be submitted by July 29, meaning the judges could issue their decision soon thereafter.


CNBC
7 hours ago
- CNBC
Trump's trade deals and tariffs are on the chopping block in court. What happens next
President Donald Trump's sweeping tariff powers and recent trade deals could soon run into a legal buzzsaw. A federal appeals court is set to hear oral arguments next week in a high-profile lawsuit challenging Trump's stated authority to effectively slap tariffs at any level on any country at any time, so long as he deems them necessary to address a national emergency. The Trump administration says that that expansive tariff power derives from the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA. The bulk of Trump's biggest tariffs — including his fentanyl-related duties on Canada, Mexico and China, and the worldwide "reciprocal" tariffs he first unveiled in early April — rest on his invocation of that law. The U.S. Court of International Trade struck those tariffs down in late May, ruling that Trump exceeded his authority under IEEPA. But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit quickly paused that decision, keeping the tariffs in effect while Trump's legal challenge plays out. The case, known as , is the furthest along of more than half a dozen federal lawsuits challenging Trump's use of the emergency-powers law. It's set for oral argument before the Federal Circuit on Thursday morning. "I think the tariffs are at risk," said Ted Murphy, partner and head of global trade practice at law firm Sidley Austin, in an interview with CNBC. The law has "never been used for this purpose," and it's "being used quite broadly," Murphy said. "So I think there are legitimate questions." IEEPA gives Trump some powers to deal with national emergencies stemming from "any unusual and extraordinary threat" that comes in whole or in large part from outside the U.S. But attorneys representing the handful of small businesses that sued Trump argue that the law does not let him unilaterally impose tariffs. "IEEPA nowhere mentions tariffs, duties, imposts, or taxes, and no other President in the statute's nearly 50-year history has claimed that it authorizes tariffs," they wrote in a court brief this month. Attorneys for Trump and his administration, however, argue that Congress has long empowered presidents to impose tariffs to address key national concerns. They argue that the statute's language authorizing Trump to "regulate … importation" means he can use it to impose tariffs. No matter how the Federal Circuit ultimately rules in , the case appears destined for the Supreme Court, which bears a 6-3 conservative majority and includes three justices appointed by Trump. But some experts still expect that Trump's IEEPA tariffs will be scrapped. "Trump will probably continue to lose in the lower courts, and we believe the Supreme Court is highly unlikely to rule in his favor," U.S. policy analysts from Piper Sandler wrote in a research note Friday morning. The analysts wrote that such a loss would effectively mean the collapse of almost every trade development that Trump has held up as an accomplishment during his first six months in office. "If the Supreme Court rules against Trump, all of the trade deals Trump has reached in recent weeks — and those he will reach in the coming days — are illegal," the analysts wrote. "So are his letters informing countries of their new tariffs, the current 10% minimum, and the reciprocal tariffs he has proposed or threatened," they added. It is technically unclear whether everything Piper Sandler describes is undergirded by IEEPA. For instance, Trump has recently announced only the broad outlines of trade agreements with Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines — and those deals have yet to be finalized. However, Trump in mid-June signed an executive order specifying that he is invoking the emergency-powers law as part of a U.S. trade agreement with the United Kingdom. Trump this month has also sent 25 letters to individual world leaders, dictating the new tariff rates that their countries' U.S. exports will face starting Aug. 1. That is the date when Trump's reciprocal tariffs on dozens of countries' imports — which were unveiled in early April and then repeatedly put on pause — are set to turn back on. Trump has said that his letters are tantamount to bilateral trade deals. Those letters do not explicitly reference IEEPA. But their language echoes the same arguments about unfair trade, deficits and national security that Trump invoked during his reciprocal tariff rollout. "The Administration is legally and fairly using tariff powers that have been granted to the executive branch by the Constitution and Congress to level the playing field for American workers and safeguard our national security," White House spokesman Kush Desai told CNBC. The White House ignored CNBC's request to confirm that Trump's leader-to-leader letters, and the tariff rates set in his recent spate of trade deals, hinge on IEEPA authority. It has, however, confirmed that the massive 50% tariff Trump set on imports from Brazil did, in fact, rely on IEEPA powers. Strangely, that letter focused less on trade and more on Trump's gripes about Brazil's treatment of its former president, Jair Bolsonaro, who is facing trial over his role in an alleged coup to overturn his 2022 reelection loss. One day after the federal trade court issued its May decision in , U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras delivered an even broader ruling against the Trump administration in a separate case in Washington, D.C., federal court. The three-judge panel in specifically found that some of the tariffs Trump had imposed were unauthorized by IEEPA. But Contreras, in the case known as , ruled that the law itself does not allow a president to take any unilateral tariff actions. The government appealed that ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which paused a preliminary injunction that Contreras had issued. Oral arguments in the case are set for Sept. 30. Two other federal lawsuits challenging the tariffs — one from the state of California, and one filed in Montana federal court by members of the indigenous Blackfeet nation — are set for separate oral arguments on Sept. 17 before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. At least three more pending cases before the Court of International Trade have been stayed until a final decision is returned in according to the Congressional Research Service.